'You are with me still' - video with Caleb Clements

This is one of those songs that, every time you lead, someone comes up after and says, "wow, that song was so powerful." Each time they quote a different line and say how it touched them.

It was written and refined by a group of guys in Orange County, CA and actually around the world, birthed at a church named Rockharbor. Have a listen.

You Are With Me Still - Story & Song from ROCKHARBOR WORSHIP on Vimeo.

For the charts and lyrics go to the Rockharbor Worship website, Click here.

For me, every time I listen I have a new favorite part. The song takes a different approach to worship than we have seen recently in our worship services. It follows the 'other 50%' of the Psalms and deals with the hard times. The painful times. The times when you really don't FEEL like God is right there with you. Yet, the hook in the song really gives the listener a sturdy ground to stand on. "You are with me still."

When all is dark and hope is gone

And silence has become my song

When doubt has closed me in, You are with me still

When strength is overcome by fear

Your presence feels no longer near

When sorrow’s night descends, You are with me still

One line of the song (that is not actually on the video) shows an aspect of response in the midst of repeated suffering and pain. It says, "My calloused heart and weary soul, will turn to trust in you." I picture this one... calloused and weary, beat-up by life and feeling like you are stuck in a washing-machine on the heavy setting. Just over and over pain - hurting - pain - hurting.

Though favor’s touch seems long ago

My calloused heart and weary soul

Will turn in trust to You, You are with me still

So, any worship leaders. Remember that it is NOT un-biblical to worship out of an acknowledged pain. In fact, some of the most powerful times of worship in the Bible come from difficult and uncertain times. We have some great examples: Job, David, Isaiah, Paul, and exc.

Here is the chorus:

You are with me still, Your love will endure

You are with me still, Your promise is sure

You are with me still, Your mercy remains

You are with me still, You give strength as I wait

"Lord, help us to understand that You are with us. Help us to place our trust in You. Because we know that You are stronger. In our weakness You are strong. We know that Your love will endure, we know that Your promise is sure and true, we look to You in our despair and our sorrow. And we ask for Your strength to help us wait."

Learning to Sing - Tim Hughes

How economics and justice turn noise into music
By Tim Hughes

It was the American author and humorist Mark Twain who wrote, "It ain't those parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand."

When I read the Bible, one thing seems abundantly clear: God is passionate about the poor. Jesus made that pretty apparent when he said, "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because He has anointed me to preach good news to the poor" (Luke 4:18). In Amos 5, God's heart burns with anger as He rebukes a people who offer up songs of worship and other sacrifices, but trample and deprive the poor for their own selfish gain.

However, the simple reality is that we have a tendency to become blind to the truth. We somehow miss the fact that issues of poverty, justice and money are all over the Bible. We forget that while idolatry is the most common theme in the Old Testament, poverty is the second. We look blankly at the fact that one out of every 16 verses in the New Testament tackles the subject. In the first three Gospels poverty crops up every 10 verses, while in the book of Luke it's there every seven. We read the Bible and somehow all this just passes us by. We're left singing our songs in state-of-the-art auditoriums, while the world outside aches.

And in the spirit of Mark Twain's little quip, it's little wonder we skip over these major themes. They scare us because they are all-too-easy to understand; they scare us because of what they might require of us. We can't escape the truth that God's heart breaks for the last, the least, and the lost, and if we want to glorify God in all that we do, issues of justice and the poor need to be at the core of who we are. This will transform our economics-how we work, what we do with our money and how we spend our time. And it will transform the way we understand worship.

If You Want to Kiss the Sky
Speaking at the US National Prayer Breakfast in 2006, Bono remarked on God's heart for the poor:
"God is in the slums, in the cardboard boxes where the poor play house . . . God is in the silence of a mother who has infected her child with a virus that will end both their lives . . . God is in the cries heard under the rubble of war . . . God is in the debris of wasted opportunity and lives, and God is with us if we are with them [the poor]."

Part of what I do involves traveling to different parts of the world training other worship leaders and leading worship at different churches and conferences. I get to work with some amazing people, to hear inspiring speakers and to see God move in remarkable ways. Recently I went on a ministry trip to South Africa with some friends from Soul Survivor. Compared to most trips, this one was fairly low-key. We led at a couple of relatively small evening meetings, but for the rest of our trip we spent time visiting different townships and projects throughout Durban. We spent one afternoon playing football (soccer) with some children who had been orphaned through AIDS. We spent a morning serving breakfast to a group of men who were homeless. We spent time with some children we met begging on the street who were merely surviving the realities of life with no home or family. We visited people's homes, we chatted, and at times we laughed and cried together. During the week, my heart was so stirred. I felt devastated at the injustice, and (strangely) fell more in love with Jesus. In the lives of the people I met, I encountered Christ. I can honestly say it was one of the best trips I have ever made. There were no big meetings. We didn't see hundreds of lives changed. On the contrary-it was our lives that were radically changed.

Money, Justice, and Worship
I feel constantly challenged to consider my own personal response to the Bible's mandate to love the poor. Economics at a certain level is a system of choices. We live in a global village; our lives our interconnected. Our personal actions and choices have an impact on others. From the clothes we buy, to the coffee we drink, to our carbon footprint-all of this has an impact. So are we making choices to bless, honor, and serve those who need our help? All of this also affects our finances. In many ways our checkbooks are journals of our personal choices. So, how am I giving sacrificially to bless others? Am I a cheerful giver? Does money have a hold on me? But this is about more than money. We can give away huge sums of money but our hearts can still be far from God. I believe God is calling us in the Church today to give all that we are, to live generous lives, loving our neighbors as ourselves.

The prophet Micah implores us to "love mercy." I sometimes wish the call were to "do mercy." That would be much easier. "Loving mercy" involves so much more. It involves the giving of the heart. It involves relationship. It's the difference between charity and justice. Charity doesn't need to involve the heart; it doesn't need to be about love. It's far too easy for charity to be about how it makes me feel, how it makes me look. There's something much more selfless about justice. Justice is about the needs of other people. Justice comes from love and love comes from relationship. Loving mercy means friendship with the poor.

Loving Mercy
In his fantastic book, The Irresistible Revolution, Shane Clayborne writes, "Writing a check makes us feel good and can fool us into thinking that we have loved the poor. But seeing the squat houses and tent cities and hungry children will transform our lives. Then we will be stirred to imagine the economics of rebirth and to hunger for the end of poverty."

So how do we move from doing mercy to loving mercy? Well, it involves seeking God's heart, praying for mercy, praying that our hearts would be softened and changed. It is loving our neighbors as ourselves, looking in the face of someone who has nothing and realizing with disturbing clarity that that could be me-or my children, or in fact my friend. In order to love mercy we need love our neighbors; those we share our street, our city, our planet with. It involves opening our eyes, our diaries, and sometimes our checkbooks and getting out there.

As a worship leader and pastor, I've been challenged to get out of my comfort zone-to see, feel and experience the hard realities of life for many others. To put myself in places where my heart and my complacency can be broken. One place that I've found that I keep being drawn back to is prison. It's never been high up on my places-to-visit list, but last June I had the privilege of visiting a maximum-security prison in Texas with a team to lead worship for about 500 inmates.

As we walked into the prison I thought my heart would be hardened against the inmates, I thought I'd despise them. But on the contrary I found that my heart went out to them. They were warm, friendly, kind and encouraging. It blew our minds. In the midst of such evil we saw a light; we sensed something of God. The guy operating the sound desk was serving a 99-year sentence. (On this occasion we chose not to question any of the sound levels he'd set in our monitors!) Watching a number of these men passionately worship was one of the most incredible sights of my life. I will never forget one man weeping with his hands held high in worship as he sang, "Amazing Grace."

Deeper Worship
These encounters have changed me. They've challenged me to the core; they've unsettled and shocked me. They've highlighted my sin and selfishness and humbled me. More than anything they've led me into a deeper communion with God. It's in these places I've discovered Jesus. And it is in these places that I finally make sense of the God's words in Amos 5:

"I can't stand your religious meetings. I'm fed up with your conferences and conventions. I want nothing to do with your religious projects, your pretentious slogans and goals. I'm sick of your fund-raising schemes, your public relations and image making. I've had enough of your noisy ego-music. When was the last time you sang to me? Do you know what I want? I want justice-oceans of it. I want fairness-rivers of it. That's what I want. That's all I want" (Amos 5:21-24 The Message).

To God, our singing and our lives are seen as one. There is no separation, and if there is no justice in our lives-no ability to love mercy-then there is no music, only noise. This is a sobering truth, and something that worship leaders need to get their minds around if they hope to truly lead music in their churches. This expands our role in some profound ways.

Another Step
We are loved by God with a purpose to love others. Giving with our wallets and our hearts to the poor is one way to do this, but there are other options. The songs we sing, the songs we write can make an impact. Recently I've been involved in a project called CompassionArt, which brought together twelve songwriters from around the world. We met for a week in Scotland to worship together and to write songs to bless the Church and remind ourselves as God's people that we have a responsibility to love those on the margins of society. From the outset we decided that all royalties would go to help breathe life into the poorest communities, restoring hope and igniting justice. It was a significant and profound time for all of us. There was huge joy in seeing that our passion for songwriting could combine with our passion for the poor to make a difference.

Following Him
As followers of Jesus we are called to play our part in building God's kingdom; a kingdom that is ruled by justice, where people are loved and cared for. Part of our musical expression as worship leaders is to usher in God's kingdom, to declare His name and to set our hopes on all that is to come. We live in the now and not yet. Our musicality and artistry can all play a part in painting this glorious tapestry of God's extravagant love and promise of a better day, where every tear will be wiped away-there will be no more death or sorrow. But the truly wonderful songs and inspiration will only come out of a heart that is set on serving the poor around us 24-7. Worship is the total alignment of our heart, soul, mind and strength with the will of God. When we worship, we will find we are led to the poor, and if we love Jesus we will gladly follow.


Tim Hughes is the writer "Here I Am to Worship," "Beautiful One," "God of Justice (We Must Go)" among many other songs. Hughes is also the leader of the school of worship called Worship Central.